HISTORICAL RECORD: FORMER M.V. KOOLEEN FEBRUARY 2003 HT 03/003

Historyworks PO Box 108 Mt Kuring-gai NSW 2080

Phone: (02) 9456 2191 Email: [email protected]

Heritage Consultancy Services www.historyworks.com.au Purpose of report: This report has been commissioned by NSW Waterways Authority who require a record of the history and significance of the former Sydney ferry Kooleen, now in the possession of the Authority as a result of impounding of the vessel, prior to further action.

Date: 27 February 2003 (updated 27 November 2006)

Location of vessel: Waterways Authority berths, Rozelle Bay, Sydney. (Update: vessel now broken up.)

Report prepared by: Tony Prescott, MA(Hons), Dip Ed, MPHA, FAPI Historyworks PO Box 108 Mt Kuring-gai NSW 2080 Phone: (02) 9456 2191 Email: [email protected]

For clients: Waterways Authority (now NSW Maritime Authority)

Contents of report: Introduction Part A: Historical and physical evidence Part B: Significance Bibliography Appendices

Note on measurements: In the historical section of this report, measurements are in the Imperial units used in the contemporary shipping registers and documentation, the vast quantity of this historical data being Imperial. Conversions to metric may be calculated as follows: Feet to metres, multiply by 0.3048 Horsepower to kilowatts, multiply by 0.746 Knots to kilometres per hour, multiply by 1.853 Register ton (100 cubic feet) to cubic metres, multiply by 2.83

Copyright © Historyworks 2003, 2006.

Note: This report is the intellectual property of Historyworks which reserves the right to authorise or not authorise its use.

HISTORYWORKS 1 INTRODUCTION

The objective of this report is to record the history and significance of the former Sydney ferry Kooleen prior to its disposal. The report follows the general approach outlined in the NSW Heritage Office guideline, How to Prepare Archival Records of Heritage Items (1998). The major archival resource on the vessel, including plans, is publicly accessible within the Sydney Harbour Transport Board records held by NSW State Records Office and this material thus supplements this report.

PART A: HISTORICAL AND PHYSICAL EVIDENCE

History

The Sydney ferryboat M.V. Kooleen was introduced to service on Sydney Harbour at a critical juncture in the long history of ferry services on the harbour. At the time the vessel was ordered from its builders (1953) the ferry services were undergoing rapid patronage decline after playing a major role serving the city for over 120 years. This decline was a result of several factors, including the spread of the city’s suburbs into the hinterland away from the harbour, thus diminishing the role of the , the construction of a major bridge across the harbour (, 1932) and the growing use of motor cars for suburban transport after the second world war.1

These changes brought to an end the operations of the largest Sydney ferry operator, Ltd., which sold its operations, wharfage, depots and fleet to the New South Wales State Government in 1951. The government created the Sydney Harbour Transport Board to take over ownership of the ferries and contracted their operation to the and Manly Steamship Co. Ltd., which also continued to operate their own Manly ferry service under increasing financial difficulty until 1974. The Sydney Harbour Transport Board inherited an ageing fleet of large double- ended ferries, mostly of timber construction and half of them steam powered, and all bar one (, 1905) built in the 1910s. Except for the smaller diesel vessels, built for river services, the fleet was hopelessly oversized and obsolete for post-war needs. The Board thus set about finding ‘the most suitable type of ferry to replace existing units as they cease to be serviceable.’2 At the same time the Board ordered a number of diesel engines from Crossley of Manchester, UK, to re-engine the best of the existing vessels - six river ferries which had been refitted with

1 A.M. Prescott, Sydney Ferry Fleets. Adelaide, R.H. Parsons, 1984.

2 Sydney Harbour Transport Board, Annual Report 1951/52.

HISTORYWORKS 2 Gardner diesels in the 1930s3, and three of the larger steamers.4

The Board appeared to be initially optimistic that patronage would grow and in 1952 was discussing a design with the NSW in Newcastle. This was to be a ferry with a capacity of about 800 passengers, the conceptual design for which is illustrated at Appendix D.5 Like its predecessors it was to be a double-ended, double-deck ferry but, interestingly, it took the progressive enclosure of passenger accommodation (which had been a trend since earlier in the century) on Sydney’s ferries to its ultimate extreme by having no outside passenger spaces whatsoever. (The design also closely resembled the Sydney showboat Kalang, though that vessel at least had open shelters on the main deck and an open deck for passengers.) In spite of its size, this design was a clear precursor to Kooleen which evolved to replace it when the Board realised that patronage was dwindling. Accordingly the Board decided that the proposed new design would be for about 300 passengers and deferred the matter until 1953 to allow further design work to be undertaken.6

In aiming for a vessel which was smaller in size than the existing ferries and economical to operate, the Board was not setting a new goal for Sydney’s ferries. After the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Sydney Ferries Ltd. experimented with smaller, fast ‘waterbuses’7, at 69 feet nearly the length of Kooleen, but these were too technologically sophisticated for their own good, their lightweight construction suffering from the vibration of the twin 8-cylinder 160 hp Gleniffer diesels powering them. A little smarter though less innovative were the small private ferry operators like Hegarty, Nicholsons and Rosman who used tried and true wooden designs, some examples of which have survived into the 21st century after several decades of hard service.

The Board therefore had some lessons to draw on before commissioning a design by naval architect A.N. Swinfield and placing its order for Yard No. 58 from the State Dockyard in 1953.8 The Board explicitly stated that the ferry was a prototype, to be evaluated in service to assist further

3 , Lady Chelmsford, Lady Denman, , Karingal, Karrabee. ( retained its Gardner engine.)

4 Kanangra, , Kameruka.

5 State Records NSW (SRNSW): Sydney Harbour Transport Board (SHTB); Special Bundle CGS 13969, 13/8045, General Arrangement plan for double-deck ferry [August 1952].

6 SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13968, Minutes of Meetings of the Board, 24 November 1952.

7 Pelican, Swan, Crane (1934)

8 SRNSW: SHTB; loc. cit., 23 November 1953.

HISTORYWORKS 3 design work. It was not the first of a class as stated in some sources.9

Commencement of construction was deferred until 1955 while issues concerning manning and choice of engine and seating were resolved.10 In 1954 the Dockyard drew attention to an increase in topside weight resulting from amended seating arrangements and suggested either increasing the beam (which would involve total redesign), using cement ballast in the bottom (which would increase fuel consumption and thus costs) or constructing the superstructure (hitherto to be steel) in aluminium. The last was the preferred choice of both the Dockyard and the Board.11 Construction finally commenced in 1955, the vessel to be named Karloo (following the ‘K’ nomenclature used by Sydney Ferries Ltd.) until it was found that there was already a ship of that name and so the name Kooleen was chosen.12

Kooleen was built in a cradle at State Dockyard and launched by craning into the water on 21 April 1956, the process being illustrated by the extract at Appendix E from Australuco News, November-December 1956.13 It cost the Board £96,000, £10,000 less than it cost the Dockyard to build it. Kooleen was a single-deck vessel with a double-ended steel hull and fully enclosed aluminium alloy superstructure topped by a double-ended wheelhouse amidships. It was powered by a Crossley diesel driving directly connected propeller shafts with a single screw at each end. At 74.5 feet in length, Kooleen was probably the smallest double-ended screw ferry built since S.S. Una of 1898, most Sydney ferries under 100 feet in length being single-ended because they did not have a problem turning at , the reason for the larger ferries being double-ended. Certainly Kooleen was tiny compared to its running mates which ranged from 104 feet (Karingal) to 149 feet (Kanangra) in length. Kooleen could carry 278 passengers compared to 500 or more for the Lady ferries. An interesting feature is that it was fitted with surplus upholstered reversible seating built for a part-cancelled order of R1 class tramcars being built for the Sydney tramways a couple of years earlier. Detailed specifications for Kooleen are given at Appendix A. Extracts from the builder’s drawings are at Appendix B and the original colour scheme is at Appendix C.

Kooleen was trialed on Port Hunter on 4 October 1956 and, in conjunction with tank tests at Sydney University’s Engineering Faculty, it was found that the vessel tended to produce an excessive bow wave and ship water over the bows, resulting in modifications including the fitting of

9 SRNSW: SHTB; loc. cit., 26 February 1954, 26 March 1957.

10 SRNSW: SHTB; loc. cit., 23 November 1953, 25 January 1954, 23 August 1954.

11 SRNSW: SHTB; loc. cit., 25 October 1954.

12 SRNSW: SHTB; loc. cit., 22 August 1955, 5 December 1955, 27 February 1956.

13 SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13970, 10/31729, MV Kooleen Architectural Plans 1954-55.

HISTORYWORKS 4 bulwarks at each end.14 Final trials were held on 18 December 1956 and the vessel was delivered to Sydney, followed by an official cruise on 11 January 1957. Kooleen then ran into its first major problem: an industrial dispute over the manning scale. The optimistic Board had hoped to operate the vessel with an economical two-person crew - a Master with engineer qualifications and a deckhand with a coxswain’s licence. All aspects of the vessel could be controlled from the wheelhouse except berthing. In the event of mechanical failure it was proposed that the deckhand/coxswain would take the wheel and the Master would attend to the engine. The Maritime Services Board approved this arrangement for operation west of a line between Bradleys Head and Garden Island and the Firemans and Deckhands Union agreed to this. However, the Merchant Service Guild (which represented Masters) forced the dispute to the Industrial Commission which ruled that the vessel required three crew (Master, engineer and deckhand) for safe operation. With the Board’s goal of economy thus compromised, the vessel entered service on 14 March 1957.15

The Board was very satisfied with Kooleen’s operation, the only apparent hiccup being frequent breakage of windows, an inevitable result of them being on the periphery of the vessel and thus exposed to mooring manoeuvres.16 However Kooleen then met the force of public opinion and it was probably this which ensured that no more of its class were built. In its pursuit of technical and economic ingenuity the Board had overlooked Sydneysiders’ passion for taking in the outdoors on a ferry. Kooleen was as enclosed as a submarine, which it resembled, and the author recalls how passengers would gather around the four half-open stable-type gangway doors to get ‘a whiff of the briny.’ This was in spite of the impression created by the contemporary (pre-construction) conceptual drawing shown at Appendix F that passengers would feel as though they would be in the open thanks to the large windows.17 It also vibrated strongly, the unfortunate passengers sharing the enclosed metal cabin with the big diesel engine (which was originally intended to be fully enclosed under the main deck but ended up with an open enclosure within the passenger cabin due to the introduction of the engineer). In short the vessel was hated by the travelling public, though, one suspects, more quietly appreciated on cold, wet winter days - this being the next generation of the same travelling public that demanded enclosure of decks back in the 1910s and 1920s!

Another early problem which was not publicised for obvious reasons was that saltwater-induced galvanic corrosion of the rivets securing the aluminium superstructure to the steel hull led to the superstructure becoming totally separated from the hull, remaining on it only by its own weight. The

14 SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13968, Minutes of Meetings of the Board, 5 November 1956.

15 Ross K. Willson, ‘Sydney Harbour Transport Board and Kooleen’. Unpublished MS [nd]. SRNSW: SHTB; loc. cit., 23 January 1957, 4 March 1957.

16 SRNSW: SHTB; loc. cit., 9 July 1957.

17 SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13970, 10/31729, MV Kooleen Architectural Plans 1954-55.

HISTORYWORKS 5 problem was quickly rectified when discovered, though by Morts Dock in Sydney.18 This was the result of a dispute with the State Dockyard which initially refused to meet the extra £2,393 cost of the repairs but finally agreed to an ex gratia payment of £1,000. Kooleen had not been a profitable exercise for the Dockyard.19 Nevertheless it was a useful vessel operationally in an era of diminishing patronage and it continued in service for 28 years until May 1985.

Kooleen’s delivery was followed by continuing patronage decline for Sydney’s ferry services and the opportunity to build on Kooleen’s design lessons did not come until the mid 1960s, and then thanks to a subsidy and design work by the Commonwealth’s Australian Shipbuilding Board. The product of this work, M.V. , which entered service in October 1968, marked a temporary return to larger double-ended open-decked ferries. Several of this type were built but the more recent trend, while retaining outside areas for passengers, has been towards smaller single- ended catamaran types. In the long-term, Kooleen offered little to Sydney ferry design (apart from its construction techniques) other than as an example of what not to do. Ironically it was withdrawn from service in 1985 at the same time as the 70 year-old wooden vessels it was designed to replace, rather than staying on as one of the modern replacement ferries.

Kooleen was sold by the Board’s successor, the , in 1986 to J. Crawford. The seating was removed (it eventually went to the Sydney Tramway Museum to assist restoration work on their tramcars) and one end of the passenger cabin was partitioned and converted to sleeping quarters and a kitchen for use as a private cruiser. The vessel was moved to the Hawkesbury River, remaining in survey until 1991. It later fell into disuse and, after impounding, was sold to P. Bujdoso in 1996. It was then brought back to Sydney where it was moored in Majors Bay. At this location it sank and was raised three times and the Crossley engine was removed and sunk at the site as a mooring block. The vessel continued to deteriorate until recently impounded again by the Waterways Authority.

Physical fabric

Kooleen is an interesting example of small steel ship construction in the 1950s using novel techniques, and innovative in its use of aluminium alloy as its superstructure material bonded to the hull (even though the choice was made in order to resolve a problem rather than being part of the original concept) - though not without an initial major structural failure. Its propulsion technology was quite traditional for Sydney ferries, using inefficient direct drive ‘push-pull’ propulsion. However, it was more operationally advanced than its original running mates, having direct bridge control of the engine (pioneered among Sydney ferries by the Manly ferries) and being unique in

18 Recollections of late Mr George Marshall, Traffic Manager, Port Jackson and Manly Steamship Co., related to the author.

19 SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13968, Minutes of Meetings of the Board, 11 March 1958, 15 April 1958, 21 January 1959, 8 April 1959.

HISTORYWORKS 6 giving the Master the ability to drive the vessel in either direction from the one wheelhouse, including steering, operating the engine and engaging and disengaging the rudders - literally by swinging around on his stool.

The vessel remained very much in its original condition throughout its service and, to some extent (particularly externally) subsequently. Private ownership after 1986 brought changes to its interior in terms of removal of seating and internal partitioning (albeit easily reversible), but major setbacks to its condition and integrity occurred during the 1990s, firstly when the Crossley engine and its auxiliaries were removed, and through an incremental process of structural deterioration. Significant corrosion has now set in to the deck and hull and it appears that the hull is barely retaining its watertight integrity. Recent surveys confirm this and indicate that the framing and main deck are also seriously affected. The superstructure, being aluminium, has deteriorated less but does suffer lack of painting and maintenance.

Overall, the vessel generally retains its original external appearance, is much compromised in the interior (including profound loss of fabric in the engine compartment) and is structurally in very poor condition. Photographs of the vessel are at Appendix G.

Context:

Kooleen was a transitional design at a time when Sydney’s ferry services were being reshaped. It was a unique design for Sydney, though probably not so uncommon internationally where many ports and rivers have fully enclosed ferryboats. Design of Sydney’s ferries has since moved ahead to completely different concepts. Kooleen is a precursor of these modern designs rather than being one of the small number of survivors of the vast early twentieth-century ferry fleet that serviced Sydney for much of that century. All examples of these modern (post 1960s) vessels survive although the earlier examples (such as Lady Cutler and its sisters) have been sold to other uses interstate and overseas. It is probably premature to evaluate the heritage significance of these vessels.

Survival of earlier Sydney ferryboats has been a matter of chance due to their fragile condition. No nineteenth-century vessels survive other than as shipwrecks. Some examples of the smaller single- ended privately-operated wooden vessels built since the 1920s survive, often in operation. Examples of the vast fleet of larger double-enders (over 60 vessels) operated by Sydney Ferries Ltd. have diminished to two preserved examples: the large Kanangra, preserved afloat by the Sydney Heritage Fleet in Sydney, and the smaller Lady Denman (listed on the State Heritage Register), preserved ashore (with its engine removed and alongside) at the Lady Denman Heritage Complex at Huskisson. Karrabee, Lady Chelmsford and Lady Scott also survive in moderate to low degrees of intactness in private ownership and are not likely to survive much longer as floating vessels. The larger steel-hulled Manly ferries had better prospects for survival and of these the largest and the only steamer, South Steyne, is generally intact and operational and listed on the State Heritage Register. Smaller sister-ships Baragoola (also on the State Heritage Register) and North Head survive in a more fragile and non-operational state, North Head having presently been abandoned in North Queensland, probably sealing its fate. The preserved examples of these larger

HISTORYWORKS 7 double-enders have State and even national significance, not only for their role in the development of Sydney but for their widely-remembered associations with a colourful phase in Sydney’s history. South Steyne also has international significance for the rarity of its large operational steam propulsion system.

PART B: SIGNIFICANCE

Evaluation of Kooleen’s significance is not straightforward. It is certainly not representative of Sydney’s ferries, neither technically nor in terms of social value, particularly the wide public perception of the ferries as a place to sit outside and soak up the wonderful environment of Sydney’s harbour. A poem by Jill Hellyer encapsulates this feeling and could almost have been written with Kooleen in mind:

Oh! What the others were missing, pressed crowded, seeing the harbour second-hand through a window, bored with the trip and waiting resignedly to reach land, while their sticky children scrabbled their feet, But out on the upper deck the four of us each drank deep from the common cup and rose at the wharf replete.20

Being able to be outside on a ferry, even if you did not always do it, was a major issue for Sydneysiders - and probably most tourists - and the unfortunate Kooleen did not have a chance in this regard. It was a design produced by a bureaucracy intent on finding the best way to address the situation of a rapidly declining ferry system. It has more significance for this than for the expectations and aspirations of Sydneysiders. The private ferry companies had designed vessels which were greatly loved, many of them household names. Kooleen, on the other hand was an unwelcome first foray by Government into ferry operation. The caption to the photo of Kooleen coming into the wharf with waiting passengers in John Gunter’s Sydney by Ferry and Foot, ‘Just our luck, the Kooleen!’, sums up the public perception of the vessel in an oft-repeated phrase.21

Technologically, Kooleen was not a great advance either, rather a bringing together of lessons learnt and developments which occurred during Sydney’s then century of experience in running double- ended ferries. Double-screw propulsion was inherently inefficient due to the resistence created by the screw running at the ‘forward’ end. There was no particular effort to address this in Kooleen, which had direct-drive propellers, probably because it was not a major issue at such a low service speed - Kooleen ran at only 9 knots, reaching 10 knots on trials. More attention was paid to bringing control of the vessel together into the wheelhouse, but even this was not fully realised in staffing terms. It was overall a simple, capable vessel but one which did not provide all the answers to the ferries’ post-war operating environment.

20 ‘Nuns on the ferry’ by Jill Hellyer. Reproduced by permission of the author.

21 John Gunter, Sydney by Ferry and Foot. Sydney, Kangaroo Press, 1983, p. 156.

HISTORYWORKS 8 In terms of the NSW Heritage Office’s criteria for assessing heritage significance22 (based on and similar to the criteria of the Burra Charter of ICOMOS), Kooleen meets the following criteria because it was a one-off innovation (albeit not a completely successful one) aimed at maintaining an historical activity:

CRITERION REASON FOR INCLUSION LEVEL OF SIGNIFICANCE

(a) Important in the course or pattern of the Shows the continuity of a local Moderate state’s or local area’s cultural or natural history area’s historical activity

(c) Important in demonstrating aesthetic Shows creative or technical Moderate characteristics and/or a high degree of creative innovation locally; is aesthetically or technical achievement in the state or local area distinctive locally. BUT has lost some technical integrity.

(f) Possesses uncommon, rare or endangered Is the only example of its type Moderate aspects of the state’s or local area’s cultural or locally. natural history.

The level of significance is considered Moderate because of the significant loss of fabric, particularly the engine, and because the ferry was not accepted by people as part of their perception of the experience of ferry travel in Sydney. The ferry is considered to be of local significance (treating the Sydney Harbour waterway as the equivalent of a local area) because its significance attributes do not extend to the State or national level. Its aesthetic and technical qualities may have been unique to Sydney Harbour, but not elsewhere, and its place in Sydney’s ferry services had no wider value.

The National Trust of Australia (NSW) has also Classified Kooleen for its experimental and unique nature, its construction methods and for being the only new ‘inner harbour’ ferry for 20 years after the second world war.

Statement of significance

Kooleen has:

Historical significance as

• evidence of an attempt at adapting in order to continue a significant historical activity, the operation of ferry services on Sydney Harbour.

Aesthetic significance as

• the only extant example of a transitional design of a Sydney ferryboat created during a

22 NSW Heritage Office, Assessing Heritage Significance. Sydney, 2001.

HISTORYWORKS 9 period of major change;

It is concluded that the vessel is of moderate, rare, historical and aesthetic local significance. It is for this reason that the vessel is recorded here given that its poor structural condition will give it little chance of survival in anything approaching original condition, if at all.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Gunter, John, Sydney by Ferry and Foot. Sydney, Kangaroo Press, 1983.

NSW Heritage Office Assessing Heritage Significance. 2001.

NSW State Records: Sydney Harbour Transport Board - Minutes of meetings of the Board 1951- 1967 (CGS 13968); Special Bundles 1950-1970 (CGS 13969); MV Kooleen Architectural plans 1954-55 (CGS 13970).

Prescott, A.M. Sydney Ferry Fleets. Adelaide, R.H. Parsons, 1984.

Sydney Harbour Transport Board, Annual Reports 1952-1974

Willson, Ross K. ‘Sydney Harbour Transport Board and Kooleen’. Unpublished MS [nd]

HISTORYWORKS 10 APPENDIX A Vessel specifications

HISTORYWORKS 11 KOOLEEN

Official number: 199171 Register entry: 7/1957 in Sydney Register of British Ships Waterways Authority registration no.: B157N

Built in 1956 by: State Dockyard, Newcastle, New South Wales Yard no.: 58 Designer: A.N. Swinfield

Passenger ferry. Double-ended steel hard-chine hull with five compartments, rivetted aluminium alloy superstructure. One fully enclosed deck (including passenger cabin, toilets and crew room) with four gangway exits, midships wheelhouse on top. 2 masts. Anchor at bow.

67 gross tons; 27 net tons capacity. 74.5 x 19.55 x 7.95 feet (22.5 x 6.0 x 2.4m) (register length x beam x depth of hull).

Machinery (original - removed 1990s): Crossley Brothers Ltd. HRN4/30 two-cycle direct- reversing 4 cylinder diesel main engine, 300 bhp, direct driving a single screw at each end. 110 volt electric generator driven by Gardner IL2 auxiliary engine.

Speed: 9 knots Passengers: 278 (seating for 215) Crew: 3

HISTORYWORKS 12 APPENDIX B Extracts from builder’s drawings

HISTORYWORKS 13 Section of elevation showing bow.

Midship section looking aft. Cabin section looking towards midships.

Note the hard-chine profile of the hull with its flat plates, designed to slow rolling motion.

SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13970, 10/31729, MV Kooleen Architectural Plans 1954-55.

HISTORYWORKS 14 APPENDIX C Original colour scheme

HISTORYWORKS 15 Original paint colour schedule for Kooleen.

SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13968, Minutes of Meetings of the Board, 11 March 1958.

HISTORYWORKS 16 APPENDIX D Conceptual 800 passenger ferry 1952

HISTORYWORKS 17 The genesis of Kooleen - artist’s impression of an 800 passenger ferry for Sydney Harbour, 1952.

SRNSW: SHTB; Special Bundle CGS13969, 13/8045, General Arrangement plan for double-deck ferry [August 1952].

HISTORYWORKS 18 APPENDIX E Construction process

HISTORYWORKS 19 The construction process, illustrated in Australuco News, November-December 1956.

SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13970, 10/31729, MV Kooleen Architectural Plans 1954-55.

HISTORYWORKS 20 APPENDIX F Interior design concept

HISTORYWORKS 21 Original concept drawing for interior.

SRNSW: SHTB; CGS 13970, 10/31729, MV Kooleen Architectural Plans 1954-55.

HISTORYWORKS 22 APPENDIX G Photographs (February 2003)

HISTORYWORKS 23

Kooleen at Waterways Authority berth, Rozelle Bay.

Wheelhouse showing controls.

Passenger cabin looking forward.

HISTORYWORKS 24 Cabin amidships looking aft showing engine opening at centre, toilets and crew room at left.

Toilets and crew room..

Bedroom created in aft cabin as part of compartmentalisation by private owners.

HISTORYWORKS 25 Engine room (without engine).

Steering (left) and peak compartments in hull.

HISTORYWORKS 26